An apparatus for handling and holding a pipe of the above mentioned general type is known, in which each clamping element has at least one sliding surface that cooperates with a corresponding surface of the apparatus in such a manner that a vertical motion of the clamping element is transformed into a horizontal motion component of the clamping element, which in turn exerts a clamping motion and clamping force onto a pipe that extends through the apparatus. Such apparatuses or devices are used, for example, in the field of offshore oil drilling technology, in order to hold and support pipes such as drill pipes from an oil drilling platform. In this regard, a pipe string is assembled from many individual pipe segments that are coupled with one another at their ends by respective mating threaded couplings. Namely, a drilling string or pipe string is assembled by successively lowering a pipe segment, then holding that preceding pipe segment while screwing the next successive pipe segment onto the preceding pipe segment, and then again lowering the growing pipe string in order to thereafter screw on the next pipe segment. This procedure requires an apparatus for handling and holding each pipe segment while the next pipe segment is screwed on, and then releasing the pipe segment in order to allow the pipe string to be lowered.
It is especially important for such pipe holding apparatuses to achieve a secure and reliable clamped support and holding of the respective pipe segment. In that regard it must be ensured that the clamping elements are oriented (as much as possible) axis-parallel to the pipe segment being clamped, and thereby achieve a parallel clamping contact on the pipe surface. Accordingly, it must also be ensured that a tipping or tilting of the clamping elements is avoided during the positioning of the clamping elements.